America could and should play a key role in both Europe and in Asia

IT is becoming clear every day that Russian President Vladimir Putin's aggression in Ukraine is changing the global balance of power and forcing every government to reassess its foreign policy.

Hence the notion that Germany would be openly sending arms to Ukraine even if it meant antagonising Russia, the possibility that Sweden and Finland may join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato), or that neutral Switzerland would agree to impose economic sanctions on the Russians, would have been inconceivable just a few months ago.

Here is another foreign policy idea that may need revisiting. It has become the conventional wisdom in Washington in recent years that the US needs to geo-strategically "pivot" to the Indo-Pacific region. In that context, the expectations have been that to achieve that goal the US would have no choice but to reduce its military presence across the Atlantic and the Middle Eastern adjunct.